not with a bang but a whimper
by spencer99mirror
Summary: He thanks God it wasn't Sophie, because he's sure he wouldn't have been able to do it if it had been her, and that would have gotten them all killed. [gen]


**i.**

Eliot changes around Nate when Nate's drunk; just shifts somehow, in a way Nate doesn't understand, can't zero in on, and when he wakes up in bed the next morning, boots off, memories fuzzy, and head pounding, whatever was there the night before is always gone, leaving Eliot's pissed-off expression, flavored with undercurrents of pity and _man, get your fuckin' act together_.

 **ii.**

They're in the middle of a con rapidly going downhill when Nate finally recognizes what he saw. The mark is drunk and drugged and half out of his mind due to the possibly lethal combination of alcohol and medication. Sophie's worried because they've left the younger trio, the kids, with the mark. It's necessary, it could make or break this con, Nate tells her; tells himself that Eliot will look after them. Then the puzzle pieces start falling into place, and the puzzle pieces are Parker's flinches and Hardison's uncomfortable looks, and the way Eliot angles himself and how the toe of his shoe is just a few inches in front of Hardison's, but there's the promise of defense in that movement, in the brush of his pants leg against Hardison's own. Eliot getting between the threat and the threatened. Eliot defending what is his against peril. Against Nate. The realization knocks the breath out of him and hurts more than the blows he takes from a security guard several minutes later.

 **iii.**

He yells at Parker to be quiet and let him think when he's trying to concentrate on the plan and she's chattering to Hardison about unicorns and raptors. She rushes out of the room and he knows he's in for a talking-to from Sophie, but isn't expecting the one he gets from Eliot. He definitely prefers Sophie's talking-to's, which usually involve sitting together and talking the situation over like adults. Eliot, on the other hand, manhandles him into the kitchen, backs him up against the counter with one hand on his chest, and growls at him to never, ever yell at Parker like that again. Nate promises he won't, mostly so Eliot will get out of Nate's personal space.

 **iv.**

He breaks that promise almost three years later, when there's blood on his jacket and on his hands and none of it is his; screams at Parker to _get in the fucking van_ , and she's crying so much she misses the door handle when she reaches for it; he has to lean over her and drag the doors closed. He holds her when she curls up beside him and sobs; his hands are covered in blood, but it doesn't matter to either of them.

 **v.**

He thanks God it wasn't Sophie, because he's sure he wouldn't have been able to do it if it had been her, and that would have gotten them all killed. _Thank God it wasn't Sophie_ he thinks, and hates himself because of it.

 **vi.**

Parker screams at him until she's crying too hard to speak coherently. Hardison looks shattered and when Nate turns to Sophie, she's crying too, tears streaming down her face.

 **vii.**

No one goes home that night, or the next, or any of the nights that follow. Not with Eliot still unconscious on the monitor screen, too pale and fragile and too many tubes and machines and blinking lights surrounding him for the image to give them any measure of comfort. The apartment grows dark and the only illumination is the camera footage flickering on the display screens. Hardison and Sophie manage to fall asleep, somehow. Nate knows Parker's awake, hears her shallow breathing as she watches Eliot's face on the screen. She's still keeping watch when Nate dozes off.

 **viii.**

( _He wouldn't want this_ , Parker says.

 _That's not our decision to make_ , Nate replies)

But in the end, that's not entirely true, because it has been his decision since the day he'd held Parker sobbing against him and dialed 9-1-1 and left blood not his own drying sticky on the cell phone's buttons.

 **ix.**

It's cold and overcast and it rains on and off all morning the day they put Eliot in the ground; appropriate and _cliche_ , and it's a good thing Nate resisted the lure of the whiskey that morning because otherwise he thinks he might laugh; laugh or do anything other than stand silent and stone-faced and counting down the seconds until he can have a drink. He recognizes Sophie's dress - he'd bought it for her years ago, for one of her own funerals - and the memory makes him smile inwardly, for a moment.

But they're crumbling in front of his eyes and he doesn't know how much longer he can keep the cracks from spreading further. Parker holds herself so tightly her fingernails bite into her arms, and Hardison's at her side, not quite close enough to touch but close enough to offer support if it's asked for, and that makes Nate feel like a piece of shit, because the foremost thing on his own mind is how drunk he's planning on getting the moment he's back in his apartment.

 **x.**

Eliot has left nothing behind except a few worn t-shirts, blood stains faded so as to be almost unnoticeable, and a small fortune in an unmarked Swiss bank account.

 **xi.**

 _You bastard,_ Sophie says, her tone icy, and he imagines hoarfrost creeping up the inside of her throat. _Eliot is gone. Hardison and Parker are gone._

His heart's pounding a mea culpa against his ribcage and he thinks he should say something, try to explain his reasons for doing what he did, but the words won't come and all he can do is listen in stupefied silence, the only thing on his mind the question he doesn't have the courage to ask: are you going, too?

 _I'm sorry_ , Nate says, and doesn't ask for her to forgive him.

 _You had no right_ , Sophie says, and the words could have been hurled violently at him, but they aren't, they're tired, and Nate thinks somehow, that hurts more than an accusation would have. You don't con your own team. it's the first commandment of working with a crew, and he's ignored it, broken it and the team with it, shattered them both to pieces on the fucking mountainside.

She waits for him to speak again, and when he doesn't, she hangs up.

 **xii.**

His refrigerator is empty without Hardison's orange soda, Parker's spare harnesses aren't in the hall closet anymore, and he wishes he'd get another chance to complain about Sophie's clothes scattered across his bed.

 **xiii.**

It's not like he'd never thought about it, because he has, dozens of times; on cons where everything went smoothly and on cons when they'd been working on the edge of a knife blade and and a gentle breath could have sent them all tumbling into disaster. He'd thought about it so many times he could list the imagined circumstances in alphabetical order. How Eliot's reflexes might be a fraction too slow, or how Parker's rope might snap or snag, Sophie's alias get blown, Hardison ambushed in the van, or he himself in a situation where he can't con his way out of a bullet to the back of the head or a noose around the neck. Maybe they'd be hunted by the many, many enemies they'd managed to piss off over the years, or go out in a blaze of glory, like that movie Eliot once rented and made them all watch - _Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid_. He just never thought it would end this way.

 **xiv.**

 _Darling, stop_ , and it's Sophie's voice in his head, her touch imagined on his wrist, so he puts the glass down.

 _Idiot_. Eliot's scornful voice, drawl dripping exasperation like molasses. _You're a stubborn sonuvabitch and you ain't never gonna learn, are you?_ so he puts the glass down.

He thinks the girl across the bar looks a little like Parker, if the light is dim and you're already half drunk, which he is. Then it is Parker, and she's sitting in front of him, pouting; actually pouting, _god_ , lower lip sticking out and eyelids lowered, her best "you've been very mean to me for no good reason and i want an apology" look, the one that's always made him feel guilty, even if what she counts as mean consists of what most people would consider 'sane' and 'life-preserving'. So he puts the glass down and pushes it towards her.

 **xv.**

He thinks she might have smiled.


End file.
